Chapter 37: Making Plans.
"What about your families? Your lives before you were enslaved?"
Elias couldn’t help but ask as he stared back at the group, stunned.
Yes, he had hoped for them to stay. He had even dreamed that at least half of them would choose to remain. But now that all thirty-one had agreed to stay behind, a new worry crept into his heart. Were they not concerned about the lives they once lived before Kael and Veran enslaved them? The homes they left behind? The people they might’ve loved? The lives they once had?
But the moment he asked, all thirty-one of them frowned at once. A wave of quiet sadness washed over their faces.
"We’ve got none," came the collective reply—soft, almost a whisper—as the air around them grew heavy.
Elias blinked, clearly taken aback. None? That couldn’t be true.
All thirty-one of them?
"How... how can that be?" he asked, his brows pulling together in confusion.
Surely, among thirty-one people, at least a few must’ve had families—parents, siblings, children, or someone waiting for them. The odds of all of them having no one seemed too small to be real.
But none of them spoke. None claimed to have anyone. That silence shocked Elias so deeply his mouth nearly fell open.
Seeing the confusion growing on Elias’s face, the man in his mid-thirties—the same one who had spoken earlier for the group—stepped forward once more. His face was calm but serious.